Terminology

This page defines every term that the other pages use. Each term has one meaning, and the other pages use the same word for the same thing.

Term	Definition
Partner API key	A credential shaped `sp_<key_id>_<secret>` that identifies an organization, not a person. Your backend sends it as a bearer token.
End user	One of your own customers, named on a request with `X-SP-End-User`. Priors hashes the value and does not store it.
Organization	Your company. Your key resolves to it, and it owns every agent the key creates.
Agent visibility	Every agent your key creates is `external`: owned by your organization, in no directory, reachable only by a key of that organization.
Agent	One memory with a role and an objective. An account creates it and owns it.
Thread	One conversation with an agent. It gives recent context. It belongs to the subject that created it: your organization, or the person you named with `X-SP-End-User`.
Message	One text in a thread, from the user or from the agent. The API sometimes calls this a turn.
Speaker	Who said a turn: the `speaker` field on an observation. Without it, the first entry of `tags` (older behavior), and `user` when there are no tags either.
Tags	Free-form labels on an observation, such as the channel or topic. Kept with the turn when `speaker` is sent.
Detail	How much an answering call writes: `brief`, `standard` (the default), or `detailed`. An instruction to the agent, never a cut.
Not learned	A turn whose memory could not be written. It is never learned later. Responses report it in `learning`, with any refund in `refunded_credits`. Send it again.
Observation	One thing for the agent to learn from: a list of content blocks, with an optional time, labels, and file ids.
Content block	One part of an observation. Today always `{"type": "text", "text": "..."}`.
Observation request	One `observe` or `observe-file` call. It has an `observation_id` and a status.
Poll	To call `GET` on a status again and again, for example every second, until the status changes.
Committed	The status value that means every memory from the observation request has been written.
Memory	One fact that the agent wrote from an observation. It has the text of the fact and the time the fact refers to. You cannot read memories directly.
Memory id	The `mem_...` id of a memory. Answers return these ids, so you can see which memories were used.
Memory search	The step in every answering call that finds the memories that relate to the message.
Context	The memory text that `observe-and-enrich` returns for your own model.
Answer	The reply that `observe-and-respond` or `chat` writes.
Source	A file that the agent holds: a document it learned from, or an image attached to a chat message.
Citation	A link from an answer to the source it used.
Piece	One part of a split document. `turns_total` counts the pieces.
Text recognition	Reading the text in a scanned page or an image. Also called OCR.
Idempotency key	A value you send with an upload so that sending the same upload again does not read or charge the file a second time.
Duplicate	A file whose bytes this agent already read. In the same thread it returns `202` with `duplicate: true` and costs nothing. In another thread it returns `409 document_already_ingested` unless you send `allow_duplicate=true`.
Rate limit	The largest number of requests allowed in a time window.
Credits	The unit in which Priors charges for use.
Request id	The `request_id` in every error. Send it to support when you report a problem.

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